Key Speakers

Key Speaker

Ian McDougall

In 1988 Ian McDougall joined with the late Steve Ashton and Howard Raggatt to form Melbourne-based Ashton Raggatt McDougall (ARM), now one of Australia’s most prominent architecture firms. Buildings by ARM are ambitious, often witty, experimental and politically engaged – characteristics that were recognised in 2016 by the Australian Institute of Architects when it awarded all three founding directors its highest honour, the Gold Medal.

Vivian Mitsogianni, Head of Architecture and Urban Design at RMIT University, has described ARM as “fearless with architectural language and form”. The practice “has demonstrated a specific and sustained view of what architecture as a discipline should strive for and be, what an architectural practice does within that view and what the role of the individual architect is.”

McDougall’s work at ARM includes nationally and regionally significant projects such as the Hamer Hall Redevelopment at Arts Centre Melbourne (2012), MTC Southbank Theatre and Melbourne Recital Centre (2008), the masterplanning of Melbourne Docklands (2007), Albury Library/Museum (2007) and the Shrine of Remembrance Visitors Centre in Melbourne (2003 / 2014). McDougall is Professor of Architecture and Urban Design at the University of Adelaide; he has also taught at his alma mater, RMIT.